Telephone Line Wire - Intertek 1802 Installation & Owner's Manual

1.3 Telephone Line Wire

Be sure to observe electrical safety when working with phone lines. Phone lines carry electricity and the ring voltage can deliver
a substantial jolt.
In most residences, the phone cable contains four wires; green, red, black, yellow. The green and red are twisted to make one
pair and the black and yellow are twisted to make another pair (This allowed for the addition of a second phone line since
telephones use only two wires). Most phone lines installed in the U.S. in the second half of the 20th Century have this type of
wire. This type of wire is now obsolete. All new telephone projects are using Cat5 wire. If you have Cat5 wiring in your
residence, the conversion is simple:
Four Conductor
Wire
Older Residences
The convention for Cat5 wire is as follows:
• Colored pairs match; e.g., WHITE/blue mark (Tip +) wire goes
with BLUE/white mark (Ring -) wire for one phone line, etc.
• The pairs are used in the order pictured: for the first line, you
use BLUE, for the second line you use ORANGE, etc.
• An easy way to remember this is that the colors run from the
sky to the earth. BLUE sky comes first; ORANGE sunset second;
GREEN grass third; BROWN earth last.
"Tip" and "Ring" Definition.
an ordinary telephone line. Tip is the ground side (positive) and Ring is the battery (negative) side of a phone circuit. The
ground side is common with the central office of the telephone company (telco); the battery side carries -48 volts of DC voltage
when in an "Idle" or "On Hook" state.
Phone Line Polarity.
Dialing) trunks, T-1 lines, and ground start lines where the field side ("terminal") equipment (a company's PBX switch, for
example) can only function correctly with correct tip and ring polarity.
Wire Type.
It is extremely important to use the correct type of wire in telephone applications. Since the Access Plus system
requires phone lines to be run outdoors or in an underground environment, we recommend that you use only wire that is
rated for direct underground burial. For example, use Cat5e Gel Filled (flooded) UV Resistant Direct Burial Cable run in
conduit for your Access Plus system phone line requirements. Do not use thinly insulated brown-jacketed telephone wire (the
type found in the walls of a structure) for outdoor or underground phone line wiring. Using improper wire can cause noise and
hum on the phone line. Be sure that phone wire pairs are twisted.
Wire Size and Distance.
Telephone Wire Run Table
Wire Size
24 AWG
22 AWG
20 AWG
18 AWG
1810-162-A-6-16
Green
Red
Black
Yellow
Common terms in the telephone service industry referring to the two wires or sides of
Tip and ring reversal is mostly immaterial, except for special circuits including DID (Direct Inward
Phone lines can be run up to 3600 feet, provided that the proper wire size is used.
Max Distance
800 ft
1600 ft
2200 ft
3600 ft
Wire
Conversion
Tip (+)
1st Line
Ring (-)
Blue Pair
(+) Tip
2nd Line
(-) Ring
Orange Pair
(+) Tip
3rd Line
(-) Ring
Green Pair
(+) Tip
4th Line
(-) Ring
Brown Pair
Underground Cutaway
Telephone
Wire Conduit
Note: Do not run telephone wires and high voltage power
wires in the same conduit. Separate the high voltage
conduit and the telephone conduit by at least 18 inches to
prevent any electrical field interference that could occur.
Cat5 Wire
Modern Residences
Electrical field from power wires.
High Voltage
18" minimum
Power Wire
Conduit
17